Every one of us will make mistakes in many things, in the same manner, the person who is responsible for book-keeping in the organization will also, make some errors in the recording of the transactions, they are called as accounting errors. The errors committed by the accountant comes under various types and most committed errors are Errors of Omission and Errors of Commission. This article concentrates on communicating the difference between Errors of Omission and Errors of Commission.
TYPES OF ACCOUNTING ERRORS
The errors made in accounting process are mainly classified as under:
1. On the basis of their nature
⦿ Errors of omission
⦿ Errors of commission
⦿ Errors of principle
2. On the basis of their impact on ledger accounts
⦿ One sided errors
⦿ Two sided errors
ERRORS OF OMISSION
The accountant’s main function is to record transactions of the business immediately after the transaction takes place, but sometimes the accountant forgets to record the transaction which is called as Error of Omission. In this case, the accountant unknowingly omits the transaction in the account books. Again in errors of omission is classified into two types, they are:
⦿ The accountant fully omits the transaction i.e. he doesn’t record both debit and credit aspects of the transaction and therefore it doesn’t impact the trail balance.For example, goods sold on credit to the customer, but not recorded in the sales book.
⦿ The accountant partially omits the transaction i.e. he records only one aspect either debit or credit and omits another aspect of the transaction and therefore it impacts the trail balance.For example, Discount received from a supplier but not posted in the discount account in the ledger.
ERRORS OF COMMISSION
Accountants take utmost care to eliminate the errors in recording the transactions, but in the process of accounting, errors occur commonly because the accountants commit errors in recording the transactions by posting one transaction in the other account are called as errors of commission. The errors of commission occur in various cases as follows:
⦿ Errors committed while recording a transaction in the Special purpose books. In this case, recording the transactions is done in the wrong books of accounts. For example, goods sold to mr.kishore on credit is recorded in the purchases book by mistake, which should be recorded in the sales book originally.
⦿ Errors committed while entering the amount of the transaction, i.e. mistakenly entering the amount 7200 as 2700 in the account books.
⦿ Errors committed while totaling the accounts, i.e.The actual total of the sales book is 44870 but it was mistakenly noted as 48470.
⦿ Errors committed while balancing the accounts, i.e. the debit total and credit total is to be balanced at the end of the accounting period. In balancing the debit and credit totals errors are committed. For example, the debit total is 7200 and credit total is 3900 and the balance is calculated as 3500 where the correct balance is only 3300.
⦿ Errors committed while doing carry forward of balances or totals of the accounts, For example, the balance of the account is 6700 but it is wrongly carried forward as 6500.
CONCLUSION
After the errors are committed, they have to be identified and rectified as early as possible for showing the fair view of the accounts. The errors cannot be rectified by erasing or overwriting the errors made because it is treated as manipulation of the accounts which is termed as committing fraud. Rectification of errors is done through a systematic method called “Rectification of Accounting Errors”. Every accountant is trained to avoid the errors while recording the transactions, but if errors are made he will try to identify the errors and rectify them as soon as possible.
